This invention relates to vending machines and more particularly to vending machines that are suited for vending beverages in bottles, cans or cartons.
In any vending machine used to vend comestibles, especially beverages, it is important to be able to prevent product from remaining in the machine too long in order to assure that the product is fresh. If beverages, for example, are inadvertently placed where they will not be advanced toward the outlet ahead of freshly loaded containers, they could well remain in the machine beyond their designated shelf-life, causing customer complaints about the poor product quality. In the automated beverage vending machines now in use, the person stocking the machine with fresh cans or bottles must first remove old product temporarily, then insert the new product, and finally, reinsert the old product in order to make sure the old bottles or cans are dispensed first. This operation is labor intensive, time consuming, and permits old and new containers to become mixed or for other reasons to be dispensed in the wrong order.
In view of these and other deficiencies of the prior art, it is one object of the invention to reliably and automatically vend beverage products, such as bottled or canned beverages, on a first-in first-out basis without a service attendant having to temporarily remove and reposition the old product that remains in the machine.
Another object is to provide a first-in first-out vending machine that is reliable in automatically vending cans or bottles, is rugged in construction, and can be economically produced.
A further object is to provide a vending machine as described above with a reliable automated mechanism for dispensing a single beverage container when the customer makes a selection.
Yet another object is to enable the vended product to be removed from a single product retrieval door.
Still another object is to permit adjustments to be made to accommodate different size bottles and cans.
Yet another object is to enable customers to easily see the bottles and cans in the machine so that a selection can be made.
These and other more detailed and specific objects of the present invention will be better understood by reference to the following figures and detailed description which illustrate by way of example of but a few of the various forms of the invention within the scope of the appended claims.
The invention provides a vending machine having a housing or casing supporting one or more interior shelves or trays upon which beverage containers can be placed in a position to be viewed by a customer through a window in the front of the machine. The window is located in a door on the front of the machine that is used to stock the machine with fresh product from the front. The machine includes means for urging the product containers toward a vending channel at the rear of the machine and away from the stocking door, thus assuring a first-in first-out movement of each product container. The containers can be moved toward the vending channel in any suitable manner, e.g., by a coiled spring, by gravity (as by placing them on an inclined tray surface and allowing them to slide toward the vending channel at the rear of the machine), or by means of a conveyor, e.g., a vibratory or belt conveyor. Each container in turn upon reaching the vending channel is released by a dispensing means into the vending channel through which it falls toward the product retrieval outlet at the front of the machine. The following specification also describes an improved dispensing mechanism that acts positively to eject each container one at a time into the vending channel.